Entanglements of the Human and Nonhuman in Euripides’ Helen

Abstract

This article explores depictions and perceptions of Helen’s relations with the non-human world. Drawing on the insights of posthumanism, new materialisms, and affect theory for interpretative assistance, it argues that Helen, animals, natural entities, and material things are interconnected in bundles of intra-actions and trans-corporeal entanglements, which make Helen’s embodied, emotional experience vividly perceptible to the audience. Three things are exemplary in this regard: the “lovely virgin streams” (ϰαλλιπάϱθενοι ϱ̔οαί, 1) of the Nile, whose features merge with Helen’s physical and moral qualities; the “egg” (τεῦχος νεοσσῶν λευϰὸν, 256), which materializes her feeling of being a “monstrosity” (τέϱας, 255); and the “statue” (ἄγαλμα, 262), which Helen compares to herself to bewail her beauty. Thus, by reacting to the Leitmotiv of the eidōlon (“phantom”) and highlighting the protean atmosphere of the Egyptian setting, this article aims to show that reading the Helen with a focus on the entanglements of the human and nonhuman allows us to shed new light on the theme of doubling, indeterminacy, and multiplicity which underlies the play.